


Ghost Man

by MistressKat



Series: Dream of Dragons [5]
Category: Lewis (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Dragons, Community: lewis_challenge, Gen, Implied/Referenced Sexual Assault, M/M, Pre-Slash, Threats of Violence, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-27
Updated: 2014-08-27
Packaged: 2018-02-15 01:26:46
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,438
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2210484
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MistressKat/pseuds/MistressKat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>“Do you see now?” the man asks.There’s spittle on his chin and he smells like someone who has spent last week drinking instead of showering but his eyes are surprisingly clear and corn-flower blue. “Now that you have it, can you see?”</i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	Ghost Man

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the [lewis_challenge](http://lewis-challenge.livejournal.com/) Summer Challenge 2014, this is the next instalment of ‘Dream of Dragons’ ‘verse and will make more sense if you read the others first. The title is a translation of Cantonese term ‘Gwai Lo’, used in Hong Kong to refer to pale skinned Northern Europeans, derogatory at one time but not considered so any more (or so the Internet tells me…). Please see the end for a further note re language. Finally, many thanks to [thesmallhobbit](thesmallhobbit.livejournal.com) for an excellent and thorough last minute beta without which many a preposition would be wrong.

 

  
**Prologue**

_Kowloon, Hong Kong  
October, 1956_

  
  
Chu Min is running. Broken glass crunches under her feet like gravel, debris from the shop fronts turning the streets into an obstacle course. The mob behind her is laughing, caught up in the violence of it more than any real political agenda.  She’d been in the wrong place at the wrong time; talking to a foreman – a known Communist sympathiser – when the factory was attacked.  
  
Chu Min had only wanted to ask about work, had no interest in human economic systems one way or another as long as she could feed herself and her sister, but the pro-Nationalists weren’t inclined to ask questions. She is clearly from the mainland and as such she was free game.  
  
She is also a woman. And everyone knows what happens to women when men fight – whether it is over wealth or land or ideas, it doesn’t matter – women always end up bleeding in the gutters, such is the way of the world. This isn’t Chu Min’s first war.  
  
But it won’t be her last either, not if she has anything to say about it.  
  
“Slow down, Commie whore!” one of the pursuers shouts, his friends laughing. It’s an ugly sound, thick with lust. “We only want our fair share. Isn’t that what you do? Give it up for free?”  
  
The streets are getting narrower, stores making way for homes, though shabby and poor ones. This is not a wealthy district of Kowloon, and the people living here will not rush out to help a leftie-girl about to be taught a lesson.  
  
Chu Min turns a corner, then another corner, wishing she was above the houses, not down here like a rat in a maze. Her hair sticks to her sweaty face, hem of her skirt hampering her movements, making her even slower, making her stumble.  
  
Then, a wrong turn and she’s in a dead end. She whirls around, intent on doubling back but it’s too late. The mob – a group of ten or so young men, most barely out of school but no less threatening for it – crowd the mouth of the alleyway, blocking the exit.  
  
Chu Min exhales shakily and her breath comes out in a curl of smoke. This is what she’d wanted to avoid.  
  
The men walk closer, bold and hungry, all thoughts of politics forgotten.  
  
“Leave,” Chu Min says. Her cloak flutters to the ground. “Go. Now.”  
  
The boys at the front only laugh, calling her names, but she barely hears them, her attention caught by someone else. There’s a man toward the back, older than the others, with slight build and long hair and something about him…  
  
Chu Min gasps, taking an involuntary step back, truly afraid for the first time since the chase began. Because it is now that she realises this is no ordinary mob of Nationalists, hunting out Commies, not when one of their number is a dragon – a dragon with the symbol of _clisk’hein_ tattooed on his forearm.  
  
He’d rolled his sleeve up deliberately, because he’d wanted her to see, to know. To fear.  
  
Chu Min backs away further, hunkering against the wall. Her eyes flit from person to person, reassessing each, but all but one are what they’d first seemed. The group is a tool then, for the _clisk’hein_ , and a blunt one at that; sent after her without even realising it. There had probably been an anonymous tip about the factory, some well-placed incitements about what they should do with a Commie-whore who’d dared to run… What it lacked in finesse, it certainly made up for in effectiveness.  
  
“Go on,” the _clisk’hein_ says, “take her,” and his words are hard and absolute, like the dull silver of his eyes. There’s no emotion in it either; this is pure business, nothing personal about it.  
  
Unfortunately, Chu Min doesn’t have the same luxury of detachment, not when it’s her life that’s on the line.  
  
The first of the boys, the ringleader – or so he thinks – gets brave enough to move from words to actions. With a sneer he steps forward, hand reaching, fingers twisted in greed, like a claw.  
  
Three seconds later he’s screaming and his arm is lying on the ground ten feet away, the hand itself still curled around thin air. Chu Min snaps his neck before he has a chance to draw another breath, her body uncoiling like the serpent she is until she towers above the men, above the shabby houses and the electric wires.  
  
The street is too narrow and she is too big, unable to simply fly away without the room needed to lift off. She turns, no less trapped in this form, no less afraid, as she expects the _clisk’hein_ to change forms too and attack her.  
  
That doesn’t happen. There is nothing but chaos of screaming humans, some crying as they flee, some sinking to their knees, babbling, the calls of ‘ _lung, lung_ ’ almost prayer-like in their fervour.  
  
Chu Min roars and twists, her long body sweeping the alley clean, men scrambling, crawling out of the way, some too awed to move and dying for it. The _clisk’hein_ stands aside, watching as she writhes like a worm in a fisherman’s hook, killing more than she means to in her panic but unable to regret any of it.  
  
Finally, there is no one left but her and the other dragon, him still looking like a man. He’s moving now though, walking right up to her and shouting: “ _Ishma, ishma, se’clisk’hein! Ishma-sah, meimei_.”  
  
He is kicking of his shoes now, lifting his feet up so that Chu Min can see the soles. And the tattoos on them which make Chu Min pause long enough to actually hear the words. And believe them.  
  
“Why?” she pants a minute later, now back in her human form and shivering – from the shock more than the weather, cool as the October night is.  
  
“I had to see that you were capable of defending yourself,” he says, handing her cloak over. “And the treasure you will carry.” His eyes travel her body from head to toe, but it’s a cool assessment of strength and injuries, of which there are none. “I have gotten it this far, the rest is up to you.”  
  
Chu Min can feel her eyes widen and she’s shaking her head before he’s finished talking. “No, no, _dhrie gou_ , I cannot, I…” She clutches the cloak to her chest like a shield, more afraid of this than she’d been of anything else tonight.  
  
“You must,” the dragon says. He hasn’t offered his name and Chu Min knows he won’t. It is said that if the _clisk’hein_ work in the shadows, then the _se’clisk’hein_ operate under the mountains that cast them.  
  
What no one tells you is how heavy those mountains are.  
  
Chu Min has never felt the weight more than now as a worn leather pouch is pushed into her hands. “Take it,” the dragon says and his eyes are old and black like coal. “The _Gwai Lo_ will need it. Soon. You must get it to him safely.”  
  
“I can’t just leave. My little sister...” But Chu Min sees the truth on his face already.  
  
“I’m sorry,” he says, and for a moment he even looks it. “We got to her already.” He doesn’t apologise or make any excuses for his own involvement. They both know he had no choice. Perversely, Chu Min is almost grateful for that.  
  
He wraps her hands tightly around the pouch for a moment before stepping back. “Kill me,” he says evenly. “It’s the safest way. You must kill me.”  
  
After what he has just told her, it’s easy. Her arms stretch and swell, hands turning into scythe-like claws and she rips him in two, screaming her grief long after he’s dead, until her voice gives in and her chest is hollow like a dry well, nothing left but empty space and a distant hope of water.  
  
Two weeks later Chu Min is on a ship, just one Chinese immigrant among many who are heading toward England and the promise of jobs created by the increasing appetite for exotic cuisine. Unlike the others though, she has more than economic prosperity in mind. Somewhere, in that island so different from the one she’s leaving behind, the Ghost Man is waiting. He may not know it, he may not even be born yet, and perhaps won’t be, not during Chu Min’s lifespan, but he is waiting.  
  
And in an old, soft bag, tied with a hemp string, and secured under Chu Min’s clothes, right next to her skin, is an even older ring of silver – a snake eating its own tail – the Ghost Man is waiting for.  
  
  
***  


 

_Oxford, England  
Present Day_

  
  
Autumn comes over night. One morning in September, James steps out and the air is crisp and pure, smelling of dark earth. His breath comes out in a white plume of steam that dissipates quickly, leaving behind the promise of a new season.  
  
Lewis is waiting for him on the pavement outside his flat, leaning on the car with his head tipped up toward the steel grey sky. He is almost unnaturally still, like carved granite rather than flesh and blood, his profile in sharp relief against the trees and buildings.  
  
Something about it makes Hathaway’s chest feel hollow. He doesn’t understand it until Lewis finally moves, turning to look at him. His eyes are the yellow of fallen birch leaves, broken by the black gash of long vertical pupils, and with a start James realises why the day suddenly tastes like ashes in his mouth.  
  
Lewis doesn’t just look foreign and out of place, like he doesn’t quite belong here on this sleepy Oxford street with some socially awkward, too clever police sergeant. He doesn’t just look like he should be somewhere else, he looks like he already is.  
  
The ring on James’ finger feels cold and he rubs it absentmindedly as he gets into the car, listening with half-an-ear as Lewis talks about their current case, his eyes fully human again. It’s at least partly a replacement activity, James knows, because what he really wants to do is run his hands over Robbie, just to check that he’s there, that he’s _real_.  
  
It’s an effort not to. With a dawning sense of inevitability Hathaway knows that sometime very soon he won’t be able to stop himself. And that what happens then is entirely out of his control.  
  
That’s what scares him the most.  
  
  
***  
  
  
“It’s an uprising! A revolution!” The man is standing on Gloucester Green, dressed in jeans and an old tweed coat, complete with elbow patches. If not for his unkempt appearance and declarations of the apocalypse he could have been a university professor.  
  
On second thought, Hathaway muses, he still could.  
  
“You sir,” the man says, pointing a finger at him as they walk past, “You know what’s coming, don’t you?”  
  
“A lead, hopefully,” James comments under his breath.  
  
Lewis chuckles as they enter the bus station, heading straight toward the ticket office. The victim in their latest case was found with a National Express coach ticket in his pocket and they are hoping to start piecing together his movements between arriving in Oxford and ending up dead in the hotel room.  
  
The conversation with the station manager and National Express staff proves largely unfruitful, but they do have a name of the driver of the bus Travis White had arrived in so that’s something.  
  
Back outside, Hathaway is just about to suggest lunch when the tweed-clad prophet of the revolution suddenly pushes between them.  
  
“Hey! Careful now,” Lewis says, grumpy but not alarmed. This is hardly the first street preacher to have accosted them.  
  
The man ignores him, his whole attention focused on Hathaway. “Do you see it now?” he asks. There’s spittle on his chin and he smells like someone who has spent last week drinking instead of showering but his eyes are surprisingly clear and corn-flower blue. “Now that you have it, _can you see?”_  
  
“Sir,” Hathaway says, taking a careful step back, “I’m afraid I don’t know what you are talking about.” He tries to move away but the man grasps his arm, fingers like a vice. Behind him he can feel Lewis snap to attention.  
  
The man doesn’t care. He stares at Hathaway’s face intently before his gaze drops down. With a jolt James realises he’s staring at the ring. “You will,” he says then, releasing him before Lewis has a chance to pull out his warrant card and arrest him for accosting a police officer. “You will,” the man repeats and then he laughs.  
  
He laughs and laughs and laughs, doubling over at the waist, tears streaming down, until he’s choking on it, voice hoarse.  
  
“What…?” James is suddenly uneasy, far more alarmed than the situation really calls for.  
  
“Let’s go,” Lewis says, pulling him away. “This is what you get now with the budget cuts. ‘Care in the community’ my arse.”  
  
The man is still laughing as they walk off toward the car. Lewis keeps muttering about the government and the state of the welfare society. It’s an often-hashed rant and James isn’t paying much attention, suspecting that Robbie is a little shaken by the encounter too.  
  
Neither of them says anything about it though and they swiftly move on to discuss the case.  
  
  
***  
  
  
It takes two weeks for Lewis to mention the ring. Not to notice it, mind, because Hathaway knows for sure that he’d clocked the heavy silver snake on his finger the first time he’d worn it to work and every day since, but to _say_ something about it.  
  
James thinks… No, he _knows_ he should’ve been the one to bring it up. Considering what had happened not too long ago, he should have been straight on the phone after he got the blasted thing. But he hadn’t.  
  
He still doesn’t know why, so when Robbie casually says: “That’s new,” nodding at the ring, currently resting against the cool pint glass of ale, the only think James can think to say is: “Yeah, it’s… Yeah.”  
  
Robbie looks like he’s about to pinch the bridge of his nose in frustration, but he resists, instead directing his gaze toward the river which runs in its ancient sedate pace beyond the trees. It’s early evening and they have called it for the day, having spent it hunched over computers gathering information about the late Mr White.  
  
The drinks had been Robbie’s idea and he had not taken a no for an answer. Now James is forced to consider if that had been because he’d been looking for an opportunity to have this conversation.  
  
“An ouroboros,” Lewis observes and why the fact that he knows the terms surprises James, after all this time, is a mystery.  
  
“Yes,” Hathaway says. “A symbol found in ancient Greek and Egyptian cultures, thought to represent cyclicality and eternal return. It had important meaning during the Middle Ages, particularly in alchemy where…” He launches into the explanation, soothed by the certainty of canonical knowledge when so little else offers it any more.  
  
Lewis lets him.  
  
“…one of Loki’s three children in Norse mythology.” Hathaway takes a long drink, drawn into his own narration despite himself. It’s like thinking out loud and he wonders whether to elaborate on the Jörmungandr mythology or divert back to the Gnostic traditions when Robbie does something that startles him into silence.  
  
With an expression that is a mixture of annoyance, determination and, god help them, fondness, he grasps James’ hand in his, bringing it close enough to inspect the ring in detail.  
  
Hathaway blinks, suddenly painfully aware of their intimate position, heads bent together over the table, knees knocking together under it, and now more or less holding hands.  
  
“Where did you get it?” Robbie asks, his thumb rubbing over the ring like he’s checking the polish.  
  
“I… don’t know,” Hathaway admits, stripped of his defences as surely as if he’d been stripped of his clothes. It makes him feel vulnerable, makes him want to run. He pulls his hand away instead.  
  
Robbie looks up sharply, something very unhuman in the questioning tilt of his head, his quiet alertness. Haltingly, reluctantly, James tells him about the envelope, about finding the ring inside. It’s not a long story and after it neither of them talks. There doesn’t seem to be anything left to say.  
  
They finish their drinks in silence. Every time Hathaway blinks he’s almost surprised to find Lewis still there when he opens his eyes again. The wind picks up, and despite the lingering sunshine, James feels cold, right down to his bones.  
  
  
***  
  
  
“Why the hell would someone who can afford a room at the bloody Malmaison, travel here on a coach?”  
  
Lewis throws the folder onto the desk, huffing in frustration. Their efforts to trace Travis White’s movements prior to arriving in Oxford or the reason for his visit have led exactly nowhere. As far as they can tell, Mr White had been a rather unremarkable young man, renting a bedsit in Hackney and working a dead-end job in a warehouse. Why he had suddenly decided to visit Oxford was a mystery. The Met had rung to say that the interviews with Travis’ workmates had been unfruitful; no one had admitted to knowing about any holiday plans Travis might have had. In fact, it seemed that no one had known Travis all that well to begin with.  
  
“More to the point,” Hathaway adds, “How _did_ Travis afford a room in the Malmaison? He seems like the bloke more likely to end up there _before_ it became a hotel.” The Oxford Malmaison had been a prison in prior life.  
  
They both stare at each other and then sigh. This isn’t the first time they’ve gone in circles around this particular issue.  
  
“Maybe he was dealing drugs?” Lewis suggests, though his expression says he’s not giving much credibility to his own hypothesis. “Stashing up the cash under his mattress until he had enough to leave.”  
  
James is shaking his head. “And what, start a brand new life in _Oxford_? If you had that kind of money, wouldn’t you rather bugger off to Barcelona?”  
  
“Maybe he was planning on one final score? We could at least check with the drugs unit if—”  
  
Hathaway’s mobile rings and Robbie waves at him to answer it, turning back to the computer, presumably to pull up any drug related intelligence on the system.  
  
The display announces ‘number withheld’ but James answers without hesitation; a lot of places and people a police officer is likely to get calls from do that. It’s probably Laura, calling from somewhere else besides her own office.  
  
“Hathaway,” he says, reaching for a pen.  
  
There’s nothing but silence on the line. He waits for a few seconds before repeating himself: “Hello? This is Sergeant Hathaway.” He’s found that mentioning his rank tends to discourage telemarketers.  
  
Unsurprisingly, the line goes dead.  
  
Lewis glances over, lifting his eyebrows questioningly.  
  
James shrugs. “Probably someone wanting to sell house insulation.” He flexes his hands, stiff from holding pens and phones and from being curled over a keyboard all day.  
  
“You could probably use it.”  
  
“Hey, hey, not all of us are…” James bites his tongue before he calls Robbie cold-blooded, flushing a little. “…as temperature sensitive as you,” he finishes lamely.  
  
His boss smirks at him knowingly, probably guessing what he’d been about to say and Hathaway scowls, uncertain whether to be embarrassed or just amused. The whole dragon thing was still something they didn’t really talk about, despite the ever-present undercurrent it brought to their interactions, not to mention the significant effect it had on their professional lives.  
  
Personal too. The dreams had lessened but not gone away. Thankfully, there had been no repeat of a case like the rogue _riek’hal_. Presently, James’ nights were full of calming darkness, interspersed with moments of breathless flight and the fleeting impression of wings, spread over the starlit sky.  
  
“…come winter again,” Robbie is saying when James finally tunes back in. He looks over expectantly, a small smile playing on his lips, but when James only blinks at him, it slides off quickly enough. “Were you even listening?” Lewis asks, eyebrows drawn together in evident worry.  
  
“Sorry, sorry,” Hathaway says, shuffling the papers on his desk. “I was just… thinking,” he finishes lamely.  
  
“Well?”  
  
James frowns. “Well what?”  
  
“Well, what were you thinking, man?” Lewis huffs in frustration. “Something about the case?”  
  
That had been the last thing in his mind but Hathaway glances down at the folder anyway, eyes landing on the hotel invoice. “Paid in cash,” he notes and something very much like a viable idea starts to take shape.  
  
“We already know this.”  
  
“Yes, but do we know if it was _Travis_ who handed over…” Hathaway checks the figure and then whistles, “…almost five hundred quid in cash?”  
  
“That…” Lewis starts to grin again, already getting up and gathering his coat, “…is a bloody good point. Let’s go and talk to the receptionists again, shall we?”  
  
James ducks his head, hiding under the pretence of pulling on his own jacket. Even after all these years Lewis’ approval never fails to send a sliver of pleasure through him, warming him from the core. Maybe it’s him who is more dependent on environmental changes, except it has nothing to do with the temperature of the weather and everything to do with Robbie’s moods.  
  
Shaking the thought off because he can’t do anything about it, Hathaway jogs after his boss, trying to focus on the job at hand instead of his increasingly scattered state of mind.  
  
  
***  
  
  
The evening is chilly, the wind having suddenly picked up enough to gather leaves and rubbish, throwing them at Hathaway’s feet as he walks back from the chippy, carrying a dinner of fish and chips in one hand, and a bottle of wine in the other. Luckily, Lewis has left the front door open so he doesn’t have to struggle with the key. There’s a part of him that is almost disappointed about that; the thrill of keeping the key even after he’d returned to his own flat is still there as is the memory of Robbie pressing it into his hand with a gruff ‘when you need it.’  
  
James can hear him talking now as he walks in, the reason for which becomes quickly obvious.  
  
“…take a message if… No, hold on,” Lewis looks up smiling as Hathaway deposits the bags on the kitchen table, “He’s here now, I’ll pass you over.”  
  
James takes the phone which he’d left behind when nipping out for food, silently mouthing ‘who is it?’ but only receiving a shrug in response.  
  
“Hello, Hathaway speaking,” he says, watching as Robbie starts to unpack their dinner.  
  
He’s so absorbed in the task, eyes lingering on the Robbie’s bare forearms, his shirt sleeves rolled up, that he doesn’t register the silence on the line for the longest time. It’s not until Lewis frowns up at him that Hathaway realises neither he nor the person at the other end of the line have spoken a word for a while.  
  
“Hello? Sorry.” He clears his throat, turning around because that seems the only way to tear his focus from the way Robbie’s muscles shift under the still sun-tanned skin, almost similar to the deep gold of his scales and… Christ, what is wrong with him tonight? “Hello, who is it?” James asks again, sharper than he means to, annoyed at himself.  
  
There is still no reply though. The line doesn’t feel abandoned though. If he listens hard enough he can almost hear… Something. A rustle of clothes perhaps, or a distant sound of the wind, as if whoever is calling is doing so standing outside. For some reason Hathaway’s gaze snaps to the window and the rapidly darkening night beyond it.  
  
“I’m going to hang up now,” he says more firmly than he feels. When there is still no answer he does exactly that.  
  
“House insulation again?” Lewis asks. His voice is so carefully neutral that James knows the question must be anything but.  
  
“That or PPI,” he answers, turning back around and discovering the food waiting on the kitchen table. “Maybe an offer of legal representation for that accident I had and for which I’m entitled to compensation,” he adds sarcastically.  
  
Robbie huffs in silent laughter. “You getting a lot of these cold calls?”  
  
They sit at the table and it’s almost ridiculously domestic if not for the folder of crime scene photos waiting on the counter and the way James’ eyes keep straying toward the window. “No, not really.” He doesn’t. Because now that he thinks about he remembers joining the Telephone Preference Register a while back.  
  
He doesn’t relay any of this to Lewis though. It’s his problem, and a trivial one at that. “You heard back from tech support yet?” he asks instead, diverting the conversation back to the case.  
  
Lewis sighs but allows it. “We should have a cleaned security tape to review in the morning.”  
  
“Excellent.” James tucks into his dinner and the conversation moves toward the well-trodden path of Travis White. His earlier idea had proven helpful. Careful questioning of Malmaison receptionists had revealed that the man who had paid for Mr White’s room charges did not in fact bear any resemblance to Mr White at all. They were both hoping that tomorrow would bring the first proper break in the case.  
  
  
***  
  
  
It doesn’t look promising the next morning.  
  
“That could have been anyone!” Lewis grumbles as they walk toward the morgue.  
  
James sighs, rubbing at his eyes. He’d gone home last night after the fish and chips, despite Robbie’s invitation to kip on the couch, thinking he’d had a better chance of actually sleeping in his own bed.  
  
He’d been wrong about that. And it wasn’t as if he could even blame the dreams since he’d never really fallen properly asleep, managing only a hazy sort of semi-consciousness, drifting through the small hours like one of the autumn leaves floating in a dirty puddle.  
  
Lewis steps right into it, cursing.  
  
Hathaway looks at the droplets now staining his trouser legs too and chooses not to comment. “You know the quality of an average CCTV recording is not—”  
  
“Save it,” Lewis barks, but then visibly deflates when Hathaway’s mouth snaps shut like he’d been slapped. “Ah lad, I’m sorry,” he says, softer now. “I’m just frustrated and taking it out on you.”  
  
James looks away, busying himself by digging out his warrant card to show at the door security. “Yes, Sir,” he murmurs, reverting to formality as usual when something gets too uncomfortable. “I’m sure the case will start—”  
  
“It’s not just the case,” Lewis comments, voice tight and low as he walks through the door, already heading down the corridor before Hathaway has a chance to do more than blink.  
  
It feels colder inside the building than it was outside, which is weird. Despite the stereotype, morgues or pathology labs are no colder than any other office building – unless you were actually on the slab in the cold storage itself.  
  
James shivers, wrapping the coat tighter around himself. “Chilly,” he comments as they walk down the corridor.  
  
Lewis casts him a curious glance, frowning, but before he has a chance to say anything, they reach the autopsy rooms.  
  
“Gentlemen, just in time,” Laura greets them, sounding way too chipper for someone who has clearly spent her morning inside a corpse.  
  
“Dr Hobson,” James says, unable as so often to be anything but excruciatingly formal around her despite liking her a great deal.  
  
Fortunately, she just smiles in return, taking it in her stride, having seemingly decided that the whole thing is an adorable quirk of his rather than socially awkward or plain rude.  
  
“What is it, Laura?” Lewis asks then, “That you couldn’t convey over the phone? Not that we don’t enjoy these delightful get-togethers over dead people,” he adds drily.  
  
“If I didn’t meet you like this, I’d probably not see you at all.” Hobson flashes them a grin that is two parts affection and one part censure. She is clearly in the mood to rile Lewis up, which Hathaway would approve of in normal circumstances.  
  
“ _Laura_...” Robbie all but whines.  
  
James would find the whole thing amusing if he wasn’t so cold, his fingers numb and stiff as he tries to discreetly flex them inside his jacket pockets. There’s a ringing in his ears too; a distant humming like the sounds of traffic or murmur of a very loud crowd, heard as if from behind a wall. It makes him edgy enough that when Laura suddenly claps her hands, announcing: “Alright, time for show and tell!” he actually jumps.  
  
Both Lewis and Hobson throw him a worried look but Hathaway waves his hand, urging Laura to get on with it. He wants to get out of here as soon as possible.  
  
Lewis narrows his eyes but clearly chooses to focus on more important matters than his even-weirder-than-normal sergeant. “Was there something unusual in the autopsy?” he asks, looking at the body now. “Was he not strangled, after all?”  
  
“Oh, he was strangled alright,” Laura says.  
  
None of them is surprised by the news, considering Mr White had been found sporting a face like an over-ripe plum, the room’s curtain cord still buried in the folds of his neck.  
  
“The cause of death is not why I asked you over,” Hobson continues. “There’s something else I thought you’d like to see for yourselves.” Without further explanation, she pulls off the sheet covering the body of Travis White.  
  
Hathaway sees what she means immediately, or thinks he does anyway.  
  
Travis looks much as expected; a white male in his twenties, reasonably fit thanks to his physically demanding job, and very clearly choked to death even to a lay eye. The only other striking detail about his corpse – apart for the neatly sutured Y-incision marring the smooth expanse of his chest – is the tattoo. Granted, it’s an unusual one; no naked ladies or grinning skulls for Mr White, not even an elaborate cursive of ‘Mum’ or other name.  
  
The tattoo is solid black, looking almost like Chinese characters except James doesn’t think it is, something about it not quite right. It’s on the inside of Travis’ arm and about five inches in length.  
  
“Is this what you wanted to show us?” he asks, bending slightly to take a closer look. “The tattoo? Surely you could have just emailed us the picture? I don’t...” He looks up then, surprised to find Dr Hobson paying no attention either to him or Travis on the table. Instead, her gaze is locked on Lewis, features etched with genuine alarm. James soon realises why.  
  
Robbie is no longer by his side, having backed all the way to the other end of the room, appearing like he would have gladly gone even further if not for the wall stopping him. He looks like he’s seen a ghost; face blank with shock and... yes, with _fear_ , and that more than anything makes Hathaway feel like the very earth under his feet is slipping away. He has never seen Robbie Lewis afraid before, not like this, not when faced with murderers, not in court. He’s a dragon for God’s sake, what does he have to fear?  
  
Apparently, the answer to that lies on the autopsy table in this very room, cold and dead and still capable of changing everything.  
  
“Robbie... What...?”Laura’s question is hesitant and she moves cautiously closer but James is already connecting the dots, his mind humming louder now than his ears.  
  
“The tattoo,” he breathes, “It’s Dragonese, isn’t it?” He doesn’t need the nervous twitch of eyes Lewis sends his way to confirm that. “What does it mean?” he asks.  
  
For a while it looks like Lewis is not going to answer, like maybe he’ll never utter another word at all. his features ripple slightly, his shadow against the wall growing briefly larger, and Laura gasps.  
  
James steps in Robbie’s line of sight, blocking his view of the autopsy table and the tattooed man on it. “Robbie,” he says, and then again louder, letting some of his own fear bleed into the word: “Robbie!”  
  
It seems to do the trick. Lewis’ gaze clears, face settling into fully human again, the yellow of his eyes fading away.  
  
“ _Threl’lar_ ,” breathes out, then, switching to English: “God, _God_... I’m sorry.”  
  
“It’s alright,” Laura says. Her voice trembles ever so slightly but she marches to the door determinedly. “Let’s continue this conversation elsewhere, shall we? There’s an emergency bottle in my desk drawer I feel the urge to prescribe.”

 

***

 

A few minutes later, they are sitting in Laura’s office, Lewis with both of his hands wrapped around a glass of brandy, Dr Hobson and Hathaway with mugs of coffee. James doesn’t really want it but he had accepted the drink out of solidarity and in the hopes it would warm his hands.  
  
Unfortunately, the effects are minimal. The cheap crockery lets the heat through to burn his skin, but it somehow doesn’t register beyond the physical level. His hands still _feel_ cold. Everything does.  
  
They sip their drinks in silence, James tapping his ring against the mug absentmindedly, the steady _clink-clink-clink_ of metal on porcelain the only sound in the room, measuring time like a tiny bell.  
  
It’s Robbie who speaks first. “ _Clisk’hein_ ,” he mutters. “That’s what the tattoo means. Travis White was a member of the _clisk’hein_.”  
  
James and Laura stare at him. “And what is...” She falters and Hathaway picks up the question: “ _Clisk’hein?_ ” stumbling over the term only slightly.  
  
“The stuff of legends,” Lewis answers. “The... Well. Not quite the impossibility, clearly, but not something I ever expected to see.” He glances at Hobson, looking apologetic. “I’m sorry for almost losing control like that. I...”  
  
“Don’t worry about it,” she says firmly, clearly more stunned by Lewis’ rare show of vulnerability than by anything else. “Judging by your reaction though, these legends aren’t exactly happy stories.”  
  
Lewis exhales, something like shaky laughter lurking in the edges of his expression. “So few of our stories are,” he says and for some inexplicable reason his gaze seeks out James’, locking for one long heartbeat before falling away. It feels like electricity, like flying through a storm cloud, and for a moment the constant noise at the back of his head grows silent.  
  
“Tell me,” Hathaway says. Not ‘us’, ‘ _him_ ’, he wants Robbie to tell _him_. It may be selfish but when it comes to Robbie Lewis, that's exactly what he is.  
  
Lewis sighs. “I don’t know much,” he starts, but then he launches into an explanation anyway, of sorts. It doesn’t take long, which is probably just as well since Hathaway doesn’t think either he or Laura breathe during it.  
  
“So...” Hobson hazards after Lewis has fallen silent again, her hands crossed neatly in front of her, resting on the desk. “ _Clisk’hein_ are some kind of... secret organisation. _Illuminati_ of the Dragon world?”  
  
Robbie nods and then shakes his head immediately after. “Yes... and no. They’re shrouded in mystery.” He grimaces at the overdramatic expression, but doesn’t amend it. “I’m no expert,” he admits, “I don’t even know if anyone is. If someone had asked me yesterday, I would have said they’d be more likely to run into a practising Jedi-knight.”  
  
“The latest census showed over 176,000 people stating that as their religion,” James injects, partly to break the tension, partly because he’s never been able to resist an opportunity to share the useless trivia his brain stores without any conscious effort or choice on his part. Thankfully, the other two occupants of the room are used to it and continue the conversation without blinking an eye.  
  
“Nobody knows what the grand _clisk’hein_ conspiracy is,” Lewis is saying. “Or even if there is one. But bad things happen whenever they’re around: assassination, revolutions, nations crumbling to smoking rubble...” He shifts in his seat, obviously uncomfortable. “Or so the stories go.”  
  
“So...” Hathaway frowns. “Travis White is a dragon?”  
  
“Not necessarily,” Robbie says just as Laura answers the question with a definitive: “No.”  
  
She shrugs. “The first thing I check now,” she admits, “when it’s you two.”  
  
Hathaway can’t exactly blame her although he is relieved that at least they don’t have another dead dragon on their hands.  
  
“Alright, a man then,” he says, before turning to look at his boss. “Then how come you be so sure he really is one of these _clisk’hein?_ ” The word becomes easier to pronounce each time he says it; the strange combination of sibilant and glottal sounds rolling off his tongue with strange familiarity. “Couldn’t he just be a... I don’t know, an enthusiastic conspiracy theorist who’s had the symbol tattooed to appear cool among his conspiracy theorist friends?”  
  
“I guess that’s possible but...” Lewis’ whole face seems to crease as he thinks. “Why would some random guy from Hackney know the symbol in the first place? There must be some connection. To dragons at least.” He looks distinctly unhappy about it.  
  
“Not to mention that those tattoos are a hell of a commitment, just to gain some cool points,” Laura adds.  
  
“Well, maybe... Hold on.” Hathaway frowns. “ _Tattoos?_ As in plural?”  
  
“There’s more than one?” Lewis too asks, sitting up straight and putting his glass on the table – mostly untouched, Hathaway notices.  
  
“Oh yes,” Hobson says. “If you feel up to it, I’ll show you.”  
  
  
***  
  
  
Soon they are back in the autopsy room, Travis White still lying in the same position they’d left him in, which... should in no way be surprising. Hathaway rubs his cold hands together, dismayed to find that some part of him had almost expected the body to have moved. The ringing in his ears is worse again and there’s a headache lurking not far behind it.  
  
Laura angles the adjustable overhead light closer to the table until it illuminates Travis’ death slack face in unforgiving detail. Then she grabs something from the nearby table, brandishing it like a sword. It’s a magnifying glass. “This is what I wanted to show you before we got... distracted.”  
  
Without further explanation, Laura pulls open Travis’ left eye and then the right, turning the lids inside out as far as they go and securing them with metallic clamps. It looks grotesque; the pale unmoving stare of Travis’ eyes contrasting with the almost violent pink of the inside of his eyelids.  
  
“Look,” Laura says and Hathaway focuses his attention from the general horribleness of the sight to what Dr Hobson is showing them.  
  
The magnifying glass, it turns out, is necessary. Without it, he probably would have dismissed the discolouration as nothing but a burst vein. With it, however, he’s able to make out the two other tattoos; incredibly small and detailed, and inked on the inside of Travis’ eyelids. The symbols are different than the one on his arm, but clearly the same language.  
  
“ _Thier’rah, mi klierk!_ ” Robbie breathes and if before his curse had been tinted with fear, it is now one of awe, almost religious in its purity. Hathaway thinks that if he ever saw Archangel Michael in the flesh, he would probably sound much the same.  
  
Laura looks like she’s about to say something but then visibly stops herself, simply focusing on undoing the clamps, closing Mr White’s tattooed eyelids and covering him with a sheet once more.  
  
For the longest time no one speaks. James keeps a worried eye on Lewis but he doesn’t seem to be in any danger of either running away or shifting forms right in the middle of Laura’s autopsy room. He just looks as if he’s deep in thought. And a little like someone just handed him a gift that is simultaneously the best and worst thing he could’ve possibly received.  
  
“Can you keep this to yourself?” Lewis finally asks, turning to Laura. “Just for a little while?”  
  
Dr Hobson doesn’t look happy about it but she nods. “We’re running on low staff anyway,” she says. “I can decide not to work overtime. It might buy you a couple of days.”  
  
“Thank you. Really, I...”  
  
“Are you going to tell me what this is all about then?”  
  
Robbie shakes his head. “I don’t even know myself yet.”  
  
“And when you do?” Laura asks, and then answers herself: “Not even then.”  
  
“I don’t want to put you in danger,” Lewis all but pleads. “Believe me, whatever this is, it’s better that you don’t know. Better if you don’t even mention these other tattoos at all in your report. Just... forget what I told you.”  
  
Hathaway fully expects her to argue. It’s a lot Lewis is asking and Laura’s mouth certainly thins into an unhappy line but in the end she only nods curtly. “Fine,” she says. “Fine.” Her expression is shuttered and James feels infinitely sad, knowing that something of the easy connection between the three of them has been irrevocably lost by Lewis’ decision to exclude her, never mind that it is to protect her.  
  
“Thank you,” Robbie says and James can tell from his voice that he knows it too.  
  
“She’ll forgive you,” Hathaway comments a moment later as they are walking to the car. He feels immediately warmer once back outside despite the wind. The ringing in his ears has also stopped, like someone had slammed a door on the noise as soon as they left the morgue. It’s a shock to realise that barely an hour has passed.  
  
“Yeah,” Lewis says. His hands look old, resting on the steering wheel, worn but strong. “But that won’t make it any better.”  
  
James silently agrees.  
  
  
***  
  
  
His silence lasts until the station and their office. Then he closes the door determinedly, leaning on it. “Talk,” he says, crossing his arms as Lewis slumps into the chair as if someone had cut off his strings. It’s a disconcerting sight.  
  
Lewis regards him quietly for a few seconds and then sighs. “Alright,” he says. “There’s no need to guard the door like I’m a convict with a high flight risk.”  
  
“You’re a dragon,” James says. “There’s always a high flight risk.” It’s a stupid joke, borderline offensive even and if anyone else had said it Hathaway would have been sorely tempted to punch them in the face. As it is, he’s not altogether sure whether Lewis is feeling the same urge right now.  
  
Apparently not, because he only snorts. “Cheeky sod,” he says, pointing at the other chair until Hathaway relents, sitting down.  
  
Lewis doesn’t give him a chance to even draw breath. “ _Se’clisk’hein_ ,” he says. “Secret within secret, shadow within shadow.” It’s clear he’s reciting a quote. “You have to understand, there’s even less actual knowledge about them than _clisk’hein_ and what there is, is speculation and rumour at best, outright fiction at worst.”  
  
Hathaway nods, fascinated despite the gravity of the situation, or perhaps because of it. There is a reason he joined the police and it wasn’t purely out of altruism.  
  
Lewis continues: “The name means...” He hesitates for a moment, clearly struggling to come up with an English equivalent. “Hunter of hunters,” he says finally. “It’s difficult to translate but you get the idea. The story goes that they were originally a splinter group; people who didn’t quite agree with all of _clisk’hein_ ’s agendas and methods. It was a quickly squashed rebellion and supporters vanished overnight. Either dispersed or killed completely if you believe one version, or moving to operate in secret if you believe the other.”  
  
“Seems like the empirical evidence supports the latter hypothesis,” Hathaway remarks, thinking of Travis White and his tattooed eyelids.  
  
“Seems like,” Lewis echoes, shaking his head in disbelief. “I don’t think you understand how... big, how incomprehensible almost, this is,” he says, sounding frustrated. “This is like a fairy-tale coming alive. Like...” He casts around for a human equivalent, “...like if you suddenly learned that Santa Claus was real. Or that Dan Brown was actually onto something.”  
  
Hathaway swallows the diatribe that tends to follow whenever someone’s mentions the man’s name. “Stuff of legends, huh?” he asks, contemplatively.  
  
Lewis nods.  
  
“Like finding the Holy Grail? Or learning that... fairies are real?”  
  
Lewis frowns at his tone, his head tilting to the side in that clearly non-human way he has. “I guess, a bit, I...”  
  
“Oh how about discovering that dragons exist?” Hathaway asks then. Lewis has the decency to cringe at least but James is far from being done. “I’m thinking that _all of humanity_ can relate to that feeling. Or what about finding out that sometimes, _sometimes_ , dreams aren’t just dreams? That sometimes, when you wake up with a taste of blood in your mouth it’s...” He stops himself there, breathing hard. That was more than he’d meant to say, more than he’d even realised he’d been thinking. “Somehow,” he finishes, struggling to make his voice calm and even, “somehow, I think I understand just fine.”  
  
Lewis doesn’t say anything, just watches him, something indefinitely sad in his eyes.  
  
  
***  
  
  
They may have a couple of extra days until the official autopsy report is released but they don’t actually know how to best use the extra time or even what, if anything, will happen when it runs out. In absence of better ideas, they work the case like any other. Hathaway calls the Met, asking them to keep an eye on Travis’ mates just in case one of them does something out of the ordinary. When asked just what kind of ‘out of ordinary’ they’re looking for, he evades the question with a long ramble about network analysis, leaving the DC at the other end probably thinking they’re after organised crime.  
  
Well. He’s probably not entirely incorrect about that, Hathaway silently admits to himself.  
  
They go through the notes again, listening to the interviews and looking at the crime scene photos. It’s useless and so too is Lewis, clearly unable to concentrate. He keeps drifting off in the middle of a sentence, staring into thin air and muttering in Dragonese. James only recognises a word here or there though even that is more than he reasonably should.  
  
That too is something he ought to talk Lewis about. Later, he thinks, all the while knowing he’s lying to himself now too.  
  
“Let’s just go home,” Hathaway says, irritated both at himself and Lewis. “You obviously have some... thinking to do.”  
  
Robbie blinks at him, looking so dazed and approachable that James gets up immediately, grabbing his coat, suddenly needing to be anywhere but here. He can’t deal with this right now, the air too warm and close, almost choking him with all the things unspoken.  
  
“Hold on, we’ve got work to do,” Lewis says, frowning. “You can’t just leave.”  
  
“That doesn’t usually stop you,” Hathaway snaps, unable to regret the words even when Lewis looks like he’s been slapped. “In fact, maybe you should do that. Go talk to _Khe’e’laf’in_ again, perhaps they can shed some light on this.” It’s part a dig, part a genuine suggestion because James’ mood aside, they still have a murder to solve. And it had worked the last time. Sort of.  
  
But Lewis almost recoils in horror at the words, starting on the same old litany about how they need to keep the existence of a dead _se’clisk’hein_ under wraps for now. Hathaway points out the _Khe’e’laf’in_ probably already know all about it, possibly first hand, which causes Lewis to bristle and more or less suggest that Hathaway shouldn’t assume he knows anything at all about dragons.  
  
Things go rapidly downhill from there.  
  
“I may just be a dumb _human_ , but even I know that sitting around twiddling our thumbs is not going to do anything,” James says. His voice is harsh and cold now, as cold as a grave, as cold as his _bones_.  
  
Lewis grits his teeth almost audibly and idly Hathaway wonders just how blunt and human they are anymore, hopes they aren’t. “Listen to yourself,” Robbie says, “You’re the one usually suggesting caution. We’ve got to think about this, can’t just go haring out with questions and accusations.”  
  
“Well we have to ask _someone_ ,” Hathaway spits. “Since – as you so delicately intimated – I know _fuck all_.” Lewis flinches and something dark and twisted inside James is glad for it. “And since you’ve just more or less admitted you don’t know anything more than what you’ve already told me. Unless you’re lying.”  
  
Robbie inhales sharply, standing up. “I have _never_ lied to you.”  
  
“Lie of omission is still a lie.”  
  
“You would know all about it,” Lewis says.  
  
And James does, oh he does know, in exquisite, damning detail. A part of him is horrified at himself, at what he’s doing; every word out of his mouth driving another wedge between them, widening the chasm until it’s like a gaping wound, too big to close.  
  
Robbie too seems to have come to the same conclusion. His expression crumbles, face lined with regret and seeing that hurts, knowing it’s because of him hurts even more. James turns away, toward the door.  
  
“Don’t,” Lewis says, moving to touch him and he can’t abide it, not now. “I didn’t mean it like that,” Robbie says. “I don’t know what I meant, only that… You shouldn’t be part of this.”  
  
James reels back as if struck. Robbie’s eyes go wide. “No, no, not like… I don’t want you hurt,” he pleads, reaching out, but it’s too late.  
  
“You can’t stop it,” James says, and it comes out too much like a sob, “Can’t you see? No one can. It’s beyond either of us,” spiralling out of control; dead dragons, dead humans, NDA, dreams, the ring, secrets and half-truths and too many things unsaid between them.  
  
Hathaway leaves, knowing it solves nothing, but too tired to care. Lewis lets him.  
  
  
***  
  
  
Despite his exhaustion, James doesn’t expect to sleep but he does. He dreams about flying again but this time he’s not alone.  


 

_The sky is bigger and the sea closer, and her wings are green rather than golden tan. They fly – she and the other half of her heart – happy to be away from it all, if only for a while. The mountains below are still wild and majestic, despite the fast encroaching towns, despite the smell of smoke, its tendrils snaking around her, pulling her down._  
  
_She twists, shrieking, himself again by the time he hits the ash-covered ground._  
  
_“Gwai Lo,” a voice says, and when he turns he sees a young girl, no more than fifteen. Her long black hair and delicate features remind him of someone and when she smiles he thinks he almost remembers who._  
  
_“Gwai Lo,” she says again, insistent. Her dress is stained red, the blood spreading over her middle, between her legs. “Answer the phone.”_

  
James wakes up. The flat is silent. Groggily, he reaches for the mobile which is resting on the night stand. The display shows five missed calls, all from a blocked number.  
  
  
***  
  
  
It’s barely past seven in the morning when Hathaway gets to Chu Min’s house. The weather is cool and damp like a grave and the mist reminds him of ash. He could have called first but he’d been unable to pick up the phone. He certainly should have called Lewis but that too had felt impossible. He didn’t know how to explain this visit to himself, at least not in words he was yet willing to say out loud, so how could he justify it to his boss? Besides, getting the door slammed in his face was a distinct possibility.  
  
That is, in fact, exactly what happens. However, rather than shutting, the door slams open, hitting Hathaway in the face just as he’s about to ring the bell. A large man rushes out, as surprised to find someone on the other side of the door as Hathaway, judging by his startled expression. He doesn’t stop and James is too busy holding his nose – bleeding and bruised but hopefully not broken – to even think of doing that himself. There’s something about his retreating back that strikes him as familiar but that pain is too distracting to dwell on it long.  
  
“Fuck!” he curses, struggling, and failing, to find a tissue or a handkerchief to clean his face.  
  
The front door is still hanging open and there is no sign of Chu Min. It’s odd that she hasn’t come out to see what the commotion was about. Odd... and worrying.  
  
“Chu Min?” Hathaway shouts, belatedly knocking on the doorframe. “It’s Sergeant Hathaway. I wondered if I could use your bathroom...” James makes his way inside, more concerned by the second as there is no response.  
  
His instincts are proven correct and he finds Chu Min on the kitchen floor, barely conscious and bleeding far worse than James’ nose. Training takes over. Hathaway rips off his jacket and presses it hard against the wound with one hand while he uses the other to call 999.  
  
“Hold on,” he says, feeling worse than useless. “Help is on the way.”  
  
Chu Min drifts in and out, crying out in a mixture of Dragonese and Mandarin.  
  
“Who did this to you?” Hathaway asks, “Who was that man?” and all the while Chu Min’s blood seeps through his jacket until his palms are warm and sticky with it.  
  
“James,” she says, her hair like the night against the floor tiles.  
  
He cannot ever remember telling her his first name but somehow the fact that she knows it doesn’t surprise him. “It’s alright,” he says, “The ambulance is here.” He can hear the sirens now, coming closer by the second.  
  
“James,” Chu Min whispers again, looking as young as her sister like this, features smooth, blood everywhere. “You have to answer.”  
  
Hathaway swallows, the understanding hard and cold like a sliver of ice lodged in his throat. Outside the house the ambulance comes to a halt, sirens cutting off and doors banging.  
  
“Who’s calling?” James asks, urgent now and strangely unafraid because he thinks he knows the answer already.  
  
Chu Min looks at him then, at him and through him, somewhere beyond, and her eyes are dark and without an end. “The dead,” she says. “The dead are calling, _Gwai Lo_. You must answer.”  
  
And then the paramedics are there, shoving him out of the way, barking questions that James answers mechanically, his gaze not on Chu Min but on the blood stained snake circling his finger.  
  
  
***  
  
  
Lewis finds him on the front steps. The place is already crawling with uniforms and SOCOs and Hathaway is in the middle of giving his statement for what feels like the fifth time.  
  
“And if you don’t mind explaining again why you were here in the first place?” PC Herriot asks, adding: “Sir,” as an afterthought.  
  
Hathaway sighs, flicking his eyes over Lewis but not otherwise acknowledging him. Robbie’s face is set in a grim mask and James honestly can’t tell how much of it is worry and how much lingering, or perhaps new, anger. Lewis chooses to hover nearby, close enough to listen but not interfering although James knows it’s only a matter of time.  
  
“As I explained before,” he says, “I was here to talk to Ms Chu regarding a case. She has been... of help on previous occasions.”  
  
PC Herriot nods, making a note in her pocket book which Hathaway is sure is nothing but a doodle. “And why did you—?”  
  
“That’s enough, lass.” Lewis steps in. “Very thorough technique,” he compliments her, “but I need to talk to my sergeant now, I’m sure you understand.” His voice is affable but firm and Herriot almost squeaks in surprise. Sometimes the rumour mill surrounding Lewis and his more-than-human status is useful: PC Thorough leaves them alone. Hathaway is almost sorry to see her go.  
  
“Come on,” Lewis says. “You can clean up at mine.” Worry and need to know what happened are warring on his face, and his hand on Hathaway’s arm is steadying.  
  
James flinches away like he’s been burned. “That’s alright,” he says. “I’ll just go home and change.” He just needs to get into his car.  
  
Hathaway starts walking toward the street.  
  
“James,” Lewis hisses, dogging his heels. “What the hell is going on here?”  
  
“Chu Min was attacked. It’s all in my statement.”  
  
Robbie practically growls in frustration and for a fleeting moment James thinks he’s going to push him against the car and physically force him to explain. But no, Lewis visibly reins in his temper and keeps his hands to himself.  
  
The disappointment tastes sour, making James hunch his shoulders further.  
  
“James,” Lewis tries again. “Talk to me. Why were you really here? Something is clearly going on. “  
  
“You’re right,” Hathaway snaps, holding the car door open, ready to make his exit. “Something is going on. And I need to deal with it on my own.”  
  
With that he gets into the car and drives off, determinedly not looking in the rear view mirror or at the confused, lonely figure slowly growing smaller. Fitting somehow, isn’t it, James thinks. It feels like Lewis has been fading away from him for a while now. James clings to his anger like a safety blanket. It’s the only way he sees getting through this.  
  
  
***  
  
  
He calls in sick, going right over Lewis’ head and ringing Innocent directly. She’s not happy about it but clearly decides to believe Hathaway’s excuse of ‘needing to process’ witnessing an attempted murder and gives him until the next morning to do so. James doesn’t think he’ll need longer than that anyway. Whatever will happen, will happen soon.  
  
He showers and changes into clean clothes. His flat feels empty and cold, unfamiliar somehow even though nothing has changed. James touches the guitar leaning against the sofa but the wood feels cool and unresponsive under his fingers, like handling an instrument in a store, not something that he has cradled next to his heart for years.  
  
He goes to the kitchen and drinks a glass of water, his stomach too knotted for food. It’s not hunger that’s troubling him anyway, even though his whole body feels concave, curved inward like a beggar’s bowl.  
  
Waiting to be filled.  
  
James sits on the sofa and puts his phone on the table in front of him. If begging would help, he would do it.  
  
  
***  
  
  
The phone doesn’t ring until quarter past ten in the evening. Hathaway startles awake, his eyes automatically falling on the clock for the time. He’s been asleep for hours judging from the way his back protests as he sits up, but he doesn’t remember dreaming of anything. Unless this here is the dream and he’s not really awake at all.  
  
It almost feels like one; a certain sense of detachment to his thoughts and movements as he reaches for the mobile, still vibrating across the table.  
  
“Hello,” he says. As usual, there’s nothing but silence on the line; silence and the distant cry of the wind. James gets up, limbs heavy, and walks to the window. Behind it the street is quiet, rain lashing the parked cars, trees bowing to the weather. He presses his palm against the glass and on other side, the night presses back.  
  
“Hello Travis,” he says, no use pretending any more. “What can I do for you?”  
  
Silence. And then a sigh; a long release of breath, a last one. “He’s coming,” a voice says, calm and without colour. James looks outside, sees no one. On his finger, the silver ring burns. “ _Gwai Lo_ , he is coming _right now._ ”  
  
The line goes dead.  
  
Someone shoots the lock on his front door.  
  
  
***  
  
  
Everything slows down. James turns around, sees a man, the same man who’d stabbed Chu Min, who’d killed Travis White, coming through the door. He’s big; as tall as Hathaway and twice as broad. But he seems afraid.  
  
James breathes in and the air feels like molasses, sliding sweet and thick down his throat. He’s still not entirely sure he’s not dreaming but when he blinks the man is still there, the gun still in his hand. Hathaway watches him raise it as if in slow-motion although it must be quick and smooth. After all, this man is a professional, the familiar tattoo on his bare forearm attesting to that.  
  
‘ _I’m sorry_ ,’ James thinks, just as the man’s finger squeezes the trigger, ‘ _I’m so sorry_.’ The shot is loud, echoing like a thunder clap, but the lightning never comes.  
  
Hathaway looks down at himself, sees no blood, feels no pain, his breath escaping in a stuttering exhale. When he looks up the man is a man no longer.  
  
“I told them,” he growls through elongating face, through fangs and flame, “I told them you can’t use human weapons to kill someone who isn’t human.”  
  
But James knows that he didn’t survive because of that, but simply because the bullet never reached its target. There’s a girl between him and the _clisk’hein_ , a young girl dressed all in red, her loose tunic and long black hair rippling slightly as if moved by a wind only she feels. On her open palm rests the bullet meant for Hathaway and as he watches it crumbles to dust, blowing away.  
  
The _clisk’hein_ doesn’t see her but it doesn’t matter. When he charges, more dragon than man now, she stops him all the same, her wings unfurling like sails of a great ship, like the morning sun cresting the horizon.  
  
The dragon sent to kill him roars, filling Hathaway’s small living room, knocking over bookshelves and lamps. He can’t change completely; not enough space, not enough time, and a ghost of a girl some sixty years dead in his way.  
  
And not just her either. Here’s Travis now, tall and determined, and Alan West and Martha Rowell, Simon who died in his car, and others, countless others whose murders James has investigated, standing between him and death. _Jissah’glek’lieskren’sayiss_ – Lisa Johnson’s true name still etched in his memory, clear as a day – rears back, fierce and beautiful, and the line holds. There are so many of them now, humans mostly but dragons too, some he recognises, some he doesn’t.  
  
Hathaway is on his knees, pushed low by the sheer power in the room, the deafening cacophony of hundreds of voices in his ears and the cold fire that burns inside him. Soon, he thinks, it won’t matter whether the _clisk’hein_ will get through or not; the dead will consume him anyway, dragging him over by their mere presence even if they don’t mean to.  
  
“ _James!_ ”  
  
He hears him even above the noise, the frantic beat of his heart. Lewis bursts into the apartment like a flame leaping at dry wood, the fire he brings spreading everywhere. Hathaway knows he doesn’t see anything except him and the _clisk’hein_ but that’s more than enough. With a sound like the sky rending apart, full of rage and grief, he _jumps_ , fully human at the start and something much more than that by the time he lands on the other dragon.  
  
It’s not so much a fight as it is an execution. Lewis has the advantage of surprise and for all his experience the _clisk’hein_ is disoriented from fighting an invisible enemy and so doesn’t respond in time to defend himself against the one he can see. And Lewis doesn’t give him the opportunity to rally. He goes straight for the throat; clawed arms pushing the dragon’s head up, teeth – long and sharp and coming out of a face that James still recognises even though it bears no resemblance to a human one – taking hold and sinking through hide, into the carotid artery beyond. Then there is nothing but a tearing sound and a flash of heat, the stench of burning flesh filling the sudden silence that descends on the room.  
  
And then it’s just the two of them: James still on the floor and Robbie kneeling next to him, his face covered in blood.  
  
“Are you hurt?” he asks, frantic. His eyes are still too golden and too large on his human face, and yet perfect. “James, talk to me! Are you alright?”  
  
“Yes,” James says. With shaking hands he pulls off the ring, lets it clatter to the floor. The real world comes crashing down and weighted by it all, yet suddenly feeling so light he could just float away, he reaches for an anchor.  
  
As always, Robbie is right there; the one thing that holds him in place and lets him fly, at the same time.  
  
  
***  
  
  
A few weeks later, they are walking through Rose Hill Cemetery. Autumn has mellowed out into something almost friendly; the sun warm despite the underlying crispness of the air, the trees dressed up in a riot of colours, like ladies at a ball.  
  
It’s quiet, but the kind of quiet that is still full of life despite the setting; a good place for a walk, although Hathaway is not sure why they are having one here. They had met up for an afternoon pint despite it being a day off for both of them, and afterwards, instead of driving them to his, Lewis had turned the car toward the cemetery.  
  
The aftermath of the Travis White case had been surprisingly uneventful, even when the NDA and Williams had shown up, full of bluster. Killing the _clisk’hein_ had clearly been an act of self-defence. Besides, it’s not like Williams had a leg to stand on when it came to that. They had considered removing the tattoo from the body – a tired discussion had in the minutes before Lewis had rung the station, both of them still on the floor and clutching each other – but with Travis’ tattoo already part of the autopsy report, that cat was well and truly out of the bag.  
  
Chu Min was out of the hospital. She claimed to have no memory of what she’d said to James after her attack, and no idea why the _clisk’hein_ had gone after her. He knew that she was lying, and that she knew that he knew, but Hathaway let it go. She had done enough. More than he would ever know.  
  
Why the _se’clisk’hein_ had been here in the first place and why he’d been killed, no one knew for certain. Although they had their suspicions.  
  
Instinctively, James’ hand brushes the ring. He still wears it but not on his finger, not all the time. The ouroboros hangs on a chain around his neck; a constant, oddly reassuring presence against his skin – there but not consuming him, not pulling him too close to the line unless he chooses to put it on.  
  
“You were fading away,” Lewis says then as if reading his thoughts. “Little by little.” He glances at James and his eyes are still golden. It’s a thing he does now; letting part of the dragon bleed through whenever they’re alone. Hathaway is glad of it, make him feel… included.  
  
Wanted.  
  
“Yeah,” he agrees. They’d talked this through already, more or less. How James had thought it was Robbie who was building the distance between them when all the time it had been him who had been drifting away, like a leaf on the wind, as the ring had drawn him closer to the dead.  
  
“I was losing you,” Robbie says then, fierce and choked, like it’s a confession torn out of him under torture, “and I can’t…” He breathes harshly, wood smoke and sulphur scenting the air briefly.  
  
“You won’t,” James says, promising the impossible because Robbie makes it feel like anything but.  
  
They’ve stopped now, standing face to face over a grave. James knows what Robbie is going to say before he says it, his gaze falling to the unadorned headstone. “Lost her,” he sighs, his expression etched with old grief.  
  
Hathaway shakes his head, reaching over to touch the back of Robbie’s hand, watching the scales ripple to the surface under his fingers; smooth and tan and beautiful. “No you didn’t,” he says, remembering the pale blue dragon at the edge of the defence line, part of those keeping him alive. “Not really.”  
  
The wonder on Robbie’s face is like the breaking dawn. “Now then,” Hathaway smiles, turning to look at the grave of a woman, a dragon, he already has a lot in common with. “Tell me about your wife.”  
  
Lewis does.

**Author's Note:**

> You may have noticed that amidst the made-up Dragonese there are a few Chinese terms and names included which are a mix of Mandarin and Cantonese. While I’m by no means any kind of expert on either (far, far from it), there is, hopefully, a kind of internal consistency to this. Mandarin is the most common form of Chinese and Chu Min’s native tongue. However, in Hong Kong, Cantonese is the most commonly spoken form of Chinese and so e.g. the term Gwai Lo comes from that. Chu Min would have spent some years in Hong Kong and thus speaks Cantonese as well. However, it is likely that my research has failed somewhere so please, if you notice some glaring inconsistencies, do let me know!


End file.
